Wired Playlist: Kick-Ass Tunes From Tarantino Films

After 17 years, audiences around the world expect that with a kick-ass new movie from Quentin Tarantino (pictured left), we also get a kick-ass soundtrack. With a nearly encyclopedic knowledge of film history — and by extension, film music — Tarantino has turned his album releases into seminal events for soundtrack and film buffs alike.

On this week’s Wired Playlist podcast, we pay tribute to the music of Quentin Tarantino’s films, as well as his influences, with a tracks from Oscar-winning composers David Shire and Ennio Morricone (pictured right), the bands Smith and Chingon, and the late Nick Perito.

Who: David ShireSong: “Main Title”Album:The Taking of Pelham 123 (1974)
Aside from inspiring Tarantino to use “colorful” character names in Reservoir Dogs, Pelham obviously instilled in Tarantino the importance of an opening song or score that gives the audience a hint of what’s to follow. Shire’s gritty score for Pelham accomplishes that to perfection.

Who: SmithSong: “Baby, It’s You”Album: Death Proof
Tarantino chooses not only his songs carefully, but which version of the song to include in the film. Composed by Burt Bacharach and recorded by everyone from the Shirelles to the Carpenters to Elvis Costello, Tarantino instead opted for this 1968 rendition by the Los Angeles band Smith.

Who: Ennio Morricone Song: “The Ecstasy of Gold”Album: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
As influential as Morricone has been in his decades-long career, Tarantino hadn’t repurposed any music from the legendary Italian maestro until 2004’s Kill Bill Vol. 2. While this track doesn’t appear in any Tarantino flick, it’s easily Morricone’s most iconic composition (both on its own and in the movie) and one of my personal, all-time faves.

Who: Chingon Song: “Malegueña Salerosa”Album:Kill Bill Vol. 2
Tarantino loves a good inside joke, and he got in a clever one when he used Chingon’s version of an old Mexican traditional as the end credits music to Kill Bill Vol. 2. One of the guitarists for Chingon is none other than director Robert Rodriguez (Sin City), Tarantino’s good friend and collaborator on Grindhouse.

Who: Nick Perito (composed by Dimitri Tiomkin)Song: “The Green Leaves of Summer”Album: Inglourious Basterds
This arrangement, by the late Nick Perito, was the main title theme to the 1960 John Wayne film The Alamo. Forty-nine years later, it’s the opening theme to Inglourious Basterds, a melancholy yet hopeful musical introduction to two-and-a-half hours of bloody Nazi-killing.